SMOOTH TALK
A seminal ’80s indie that still holds up as a provocative and disturbing psychological horror story
SISTER MY SISTER
A terrific British film about the notorious Papin sisters, French maids who in 1933 murdered their female employer and her daughter while carrying on a torrid incestuous relationship
AN AMERICAN CRIME
A dramatization of the 1965 torture murder of 16-year-old Sylvia Likens, and about as good as can be expected of a true crime drama from the director of ELLA ENCHANTED and the star of JUNO
ZODIAC
I can’t imagine a better movie about the still-unsolved “Zodiac” killings that plagued San Francisco during the late sixties and early seventies
POLANSKI UNAUTHORIZED
The life of Roman Polanski is great material for a horror film without question, but this cheesy 2009 biopic is far from a great movie
PATTY HEARST
The 1974 abduction and brainwashing of Patty Hearst reconfigured as a CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI-esque horror show
GUYANA: CULT OF THE DAMNED
A trashier-than-average Jim Jones cash-in, directed by Rene Cardona Jr. and featuring several slumming movie stars
THE GIRL NEXT DOOR
From one of the roughest, most uncompromising horror novels ever comes a profoundly graphic and disturbing film
THE LOST
THE LOST, the first film adapted from the work of novelist Jack Ketchum, is a skilled and intelligent but strictly not-for-the-squeamish viewing experience
2014: Bedlam in Print
2014 was an above-average year for books in my view. Quite a few terrific titles turned up from both established and debuting authors, with a few, I’m certain, that will go on to become classics